Just wonderful. Kusunoki has really outdone herself this time. Everything is top-notch. 10/10.
Add on - In response to the comment made by danielabda on the motives of the main character -
You wonder why the main character does what he does... Well theres several explainations for this. One is that its freaking human compassion! Another is that the story's whole motif is based on this this inner conflict of the character, and thats why you are reading the story in the first place. Third is because of his past, he acts because he can relate on some level. And lastly are the explainations stated by loverun.
Anyways I highly recommend this manga because it is filled with so much empathy, character development, and above all, the grim nature of abortion and the trauma that does encompass it. This manga strikes such a chord with me because it doesnt use cheap scare tactics such as 'Deep Love' or 'Elfen Lied' or even 'Gantz' to get the audience's attention. This story has death and life written all over it, but rendered tastefully.
In addition I'd like to state how this story is so much greater when you examine the author's background and the concept of the story itself. I know all you have to do is click the link to her name and see what kind of works she has done, but i think I'd like to praise her here again because most of the stories she has written prior to this have been the comedy/romance/ecchi and even horror demographs. I appreciate this manga so much more because she writes it from a motherly standpoint and literally pours so much of herself into it, and is so great i can't really give it justice by my small description here.
i love this story just because of its flexibility and its lack of confirmity to a genre. I think that anyone looking for some soul-searchin' is gonna find something of value in this story. But i guess if you're looking for action, you outta look elsewhere. From exploring the concept of motherly love, to the motivations of kindness to the horror of rape, theres reality written all over it.
Oh yeah, i guess i should justify why it doesnt use the 'scare tactics' seen in other mangas... This is mainly because all the characters are redeemable. I will choose to contrast this to elfen lied, mainly because it shares the same themes of human kindness, love, death, life morals, etc... Also because elfen lied is seen as one of the better manga's out there. One of this manga's greatest virtues is that it throughly gives us the personal thoguhts (asides/soloquies) of each of the characters, and if not directly, it does find a way. And it manages to do this all in about 23 chapters! (well thats what i've read so far) Unlike Elfen Lied which has gone about x4 the length. Thus its main greatness is seen in the amazing compactness of the entire manga. Each page is infused with purpose and carefully thought out. Finally I give praise to this manga because amazing drawing style. The author already had to compromise much in the making of this manga, but yet still manages to crank out a manga that has both shoujo and shounen elements but balances both better than any other manga ive read so far with the same elements (inuyasha, elfen lied....)
Oh and probably the most important thing, the male character in this manga is the most redeemable male character i have even read in a manga, in any genre. He's just so brilliantly tacted together, such a finite balance between his age!, and thats another thing thats brilliant about this manga, the characters freakin' act their age. Our protagonist is a regular guy with no special attributes, set in a shounen stereotype, but manages to come off as neither a pathethic womanizer (Suzuka, Love Hina, Gantz, hundreds of other shounen characters), nor one that unrealiscally has it 'all together' (GTO, Wolf and Spice). To an extent, he actually understands his own character flaws and knows perhaps more than even 'Kyon' in the SoS brigade at a subconsious level. He acts his age, completely with all the flaws and hormonal limitations that come with that , but makes the correct deicsions, whilst redeeming himself from his mistakes.
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